For the several decades of the PC era, Asymco's Dediu points out, Microsoft has benefited from the "tax" payments that accrued to it by way of Windows and Office licenses. He reckons that Windows revenues per PC have held steady for the last three years, currently sitting at $52 per PC, while the figure for Office has crept up somewhat during that period to $67 per PC.
"The problem for Microsoft," he writes, "is that pricing systems software at $50 and a suite of apps at $67 for a tablet that costs $200 to the end-user is prohibitive."